


19 times

by skyewardsstan_fics (nathyfaith)



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-20
Updated: 2014-06-20
Packaged: 2018-02-05 11:34:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,485
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1817089
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nathyfaith/pseuds/skyewardsstan_fics
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>19 times Ward tells people he loves Skye, and times he clearly blunts it at her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	19 times

**Author's Note:**

> A new fic from skyewardsstan, it was a gift for a friend skyewward.  
> Hope you guys enjoy it, I certainly did.  
> It's freaking adorable.

**[one]**

The first time it happens, it happens when they are training. He didn’t mean to, but the words slipped out of his mouth so easily, he can’t bring himself to regret it. Plus, the way Skye’s looking at him now makes his stomach do little flips, so he guesses it was the right thing to say.

They were arguing, which was a daily occurrence that Fitz and Simmons didn’t even bother to get out of the lab and ask what the shouting was all about. Skye is stubborn and Ward is stubborn, and really, what else do you expect. He’s shouting about how she’s so unfocused, and she’s shouting how he should get his head out of his ass.

Long story short, he’s got her pinned to the wall, crushing her body with his and his face is so close, they’re practically breathing the same air.

“That’s all that I am to you, am I, Ward?” she taunted, never backing down, and holding her chin higher. “Just a responsibility you have to keep your eye on to protect your little spotless reputation. That’s what we’re all to you, right? Just a responsibility, but you have to get your head out of your ass and stop treating me like a china doll because I don’t need your protection, Ward. I don’t –”

She stops talking the moment his fist land on the surface beside her head. “Stop saying that, because I swear to God, Skye, even if I love you, I will double your training for the next three weeks.”

**[two]**

They both decide that the first time was an accident. That the first time he said he loves her was in the heat of the moment, and he didn’t mean it. They don’t talk about it. Hell, they don’t talk to each other anymore.

So when they, more like he, talk, it’s just whispers and asked promises. They just finished a recon op and everyone’s injured and tired. She was the first one to get patched up and she’s now sleeping in her bunk. He finds his way to her bunk, not minding his injured leg. “I’m fine,” he told Simmons when the woman insisted that he should get patched up second, but he insisted that May needed to get patched up before him.

He doesn’t knock on her door. He overrides the lock, steps in the dimly lit room and gently closes the door behind him. He takes a moment to appreciate what’s in front of him; hair sprawled on her pillow, lips parted, eyes closed, arms folded atop her stomach. He closes the distance between them and sits beside her hips, as he gently brushes her hair. She stirs, but she doesn’t wake up, and he takes that as a signal.

“We almost lost you today again, Rookie,” he whispers. “I told you going in wasn’t safe, but I don’t think God himself will be able to stop you.” He pauses and retracts his hand away from her hair when she moves her head. When he realizes that she’s unconsciously leaning to his hand, he continues brushing. After a few more minutes of contemplating, he leans down and kisses her temple while he murmurs, “Don’t scare me like that again, okay. God knows how much I love you.”

He looks at her one more time before he closes her door behind him. She’s smiling in her sleep and that’s how he also finds himself later in his bunk.

**[three]**

He makes her breakfast the next day.  He makes her a fruit shake with her favorite fruit. He makes her pancakes as well, and he adds blueberries because he could still remember how she smiled when they ate at a diner and she was served with blueberry pancakes. He smiles when she comes to the kitchen, rubbing her sleepy eyes.

“Hey,” he greets her. “Good morning. You okay?” he asks pointing to her stomach. She nods and he motions her to sit in front of him. “I made you breakfast,” he says and he’s rewarded with the same smile she had back at the diner.

They eat in silence, with him watching her and her, trying so hard to ignore his eyes. Fitz comes in when she’s chewing her last bite.

“Oh, hey, pancakes,” Fitz says as he inhales.

“Oh, sorry, Fitz,” Ward smiles regretfully. “I only made three for Skye. I can make more if you want?”

“Nah,” Fitz smiles back. “It’s okay, mate. It’s kind of a thing you do for the person you love.”

“Well, you aren’t wrong,” Ward answers and when he looks back at Skye, he can see the blush forming on her cheeks.

**[four]**

She makes him breakfast the next morning.

He’s grumpy as hell, and he’s mumbling something about paperworks and reports Coulson made him do the entire night and how he had little time to sleep. He takes a sip of the coffee she made, the way he likes it, and groans, “This is heavenly, Skye. God, I love you so much.”

She makes a mental note to make him coffee every morning.

**[five]**

Simmons chokes on her tea when she hears Ward say those words again. Fitz and Skye are sent in an undercover mission, and she and Ward stay on the Bus to keep their eyes on their teammates, as May and Coulson wait on site as an extraction.

Skye makes a harsh decision to approach their target alone, reasoning that if Fitz came with her, their target would not seem interested. They all disagree with her, but when the target is about to leave, everyone (except Ward) gives their approval to her to go in. She flirts, and touches him, and giggles, and Ward tries his damndest to look like he doesn’t care. Skye gets the job done, and the target is now unconscious on the hotel room floor. Ward doesn’t want to remember how Skye got him in there.

Skye’s on her way back to the ball room with a proud smile on her face, and her hand to her ear. “Skipper to Bravo, target unconcious. Room E, 3rd floor.”

_“You kissed him!”_

“Geez, Ward. It was just a kiss,” Skye rolls her eyes.

_“I swear to God. You are not allowed to go on undercover missions without me by your side, or so help me..”_

“Geez, Ward,” Skye repeats again. “Chill.”

_“Don’t tell me to ‘chill’. Just because you know I love you, doesn’t mean you go around kissing other people.”_

And then and there, Simmons chokes on her tea.

**[six]**

When Skye, Fitz, Coulson and May return to the Bus a few hours later, Ward and Simmons are waiting for them at the cargo hold. Simmons has a bright proud smile on her face, while Ward has the opposite. Skye still has her lipstick smudged and Ward strides forward to wipe it. He takes her face in his hands, oblivious to his teammates watching them.

“What the fuck were you thinking?” he snaps as he wipes the corner of mouth. How he could sound so stern while his hands are so gentle is beyond Skye. “Going in there alone. Seriously, Skye. What if his body guards caught up and figured you were not really Mrs. Brown?”

“Ward, it’s done. Let it go,” she murmurs.

“ _Let it go_ ,” he scoffs. “Yeah, because letting the woman I love kiss another guy is perfectly fine.” His hand is nowhere near her mouth, but that makes her shut up.

**[seven]**

On a perfectly normal day, or as normal as it could get when you are an agent of SHIELD, she doesn’t expect him to blurt out those words again. It’s not directed to her, but the people he’s saying the words to seem so important that she feels like she’s shrinking under their gazes.

“Agent Ward,” the man greets as he shakes the hand Ward held out.

“Agent Trip,” Ward nods. They talk about their S.O., who Skye heard is named Agent Garrett. The man in question appears out of the shadows, wearing a black turtleneck and black pants and boots.

“Boys,” he greets them. Both men greeted him with a nod and a “Sir.”

“Nice to see you boys hanging out,” Agent Garrett says, and when he catches a glimpse of her behind Ward, he smiles widely at her. “And who is this beautiful lady?”

“This is my Rookie, Skye,” Ward introduces her to both Agent Trip and Agent Garrett.

“You, Grant Ward, have your own rookie?” Agent Garrett laughs. “Antoine, can you make sure this is  _our_  Grant Ward? My Grant Ward doesn’t like people, as far as I know. “

“Well, I do love her and that makes all the difference,” Ward shrugs and when Agent Garrett and Agent Trip (with his perfect eyebrows raised) look at her, she can only smile back at them.

**[eight]**

He doesn’t expect her to corner him one day. He just finished sparring with Triplett, and when he’s on his way to the showers, he doesn’t expect his arm to be grabbed by someone and for himself to be dragged away from the eyes and ears of anyone in the Bus.

"What the hell?" he snaps, taking his arm back. He whips around and his gaze falters once they land on the eyes of –  _"May?"_

"Ward."

"What do you want?"

“Coulson is going to kidnap you later and –”

"Wait, what?"

"Shut up and let me finish. Coulson is going to ask for you later, and he’s going to keep you holed up in his office for God knows how long. He saw you and Triplett yesterday when he was talking to you about Skye. He’s going to give you the ‘dad talk’, so just listen to him. Agree to whatever he says, and do not question his intentions. Do I make myself clear?"

Ward’s mouth is still gaping when she finishes talking. It takes May to snap her fingers in front of his face to get him back and and when he does, the corridor is filled with a shout of  _"What?"_

May rolls her eyes and asks, “Do I need to repeat myself?”

"No, no," Ward shakes his head, still trying to process what he just heard. “I just –”

"Do you love Skye?"

“Yes, I do, but –”

"Then don’t question Coulson later, or you won’t have the chance to love Skye by tomorrow morning."

**[nine** (what Coulson saw the day before) **]**

“Someone’s hitting on your girl.”

“Hmm.”

“Ward, did you hear me?”

“Hmm.”

“Ward, someone’s making a move on Skye.”

Well, that does the trick. Ward’s head snaps up from the paperwork he’s doing in his temporary office in the Hub. Apparently, all reports concerning the Hub and the agents stationed there were to be done only in the Hub. “Who came up with that stupid rule?” he asked once when he was shown his temporary office (more like a table and a chair which could only fit a Skye) but when Agent Hand cleared her throat, he knew the subject was to be dropped.

“What did you say?”

“Agent Carter over there -” Trip motions his head sideways to where Skye’s own temporary office was. And she was surrounded by what Ward assumes is five to seven agents. “- is really having Skye rolling on the floor laughing. I’d say they’d go out tomorrow night, if not tonight, that is.”

“ _What_?” he snaps as he strides over to the group of agents. He bumps the small table (“I hate this stupid office!”) and the cup of pencils and pens fall to the floor, but that doesn’t matter now. He pushes the crowd out of the way as he shouts, “Skye!”

Skye spins on her rolling chair and wipes her eyes, tears of joy, Ward presumes. “Yeah, Ward?”

“Who’s Agent Carter?” he asks straight to the point as he narrows his eyes towards the agents around her; three guys and four girls.

“That would be me,” an agent speaks up and steps forward in between Skye and Ward, and Ward blinks hard because it’s a lady. “Agent Ward, nice meeting you. I’m Sharon Carter. What can I do for you?”

Ward looks back to his office and sees Triplett on the floor, laughing his ass off. He turns back to the group of agents in front of him, and shakes his head no, “Nothing. I was just- Nothing. Nice meeting you.”

He walks back to his office and crosses his arms over his chest while glaring down at Triplett who’s still laughing while sitting on the floor. “You suck,” Ward says to him.

“Oh, man,” Trip says as he wipes his eyes. “I never said Agent Carter was a dude. You should have seen the look on your face. Oh god, I should ask someone for a copy of today’s surveillance of this room.”

Ward continues glaring, but nothing seems to faze the laughing agent so he gives up, and continues his paperwork. He’s halfway through his work when Trip stands up and leans against the wall, watching Ward. The agent sighs and lifts his head, “Anything else you want, Trip?”

“You love her,” Trip says. Ward drops his head again, but Trip sees the small smile and blush on Ward’s face.

**[ten]**

When May tells him to go and continue whatever it was he was supposed to do before she took him, he didn’t expect Coulson to ‘kidnap’ him right away. Again, he’s grabbed by the arm and the next thing he knows, he’s sat in front of Coulson’s desk in his office.

Coulson goes straight to the point, just like May, and doesn’t waste a single breath. “What are your intentions with Skye?”

“Nothing, Sir.” It’s the truth, really. He hasn’t said those three words directly to her, and he frowns when he remembers all the times he slipped and he never got a response from her.

“Nothing  _yet_.”

“Yet,” Ward agrees.

“If you hurt a single hair on that girl, you will find yourself shipped to the Fridge.”

“Yes, Sir.”

“If you as much lift a finger on her, I will lock you up in a cell the size of your shoe.”

“Yes, Sir.”

“If you make her cry, I will let May loose on you.”

That makes him swallow. Hard. “Yes, Sir.”

“Do you love her?”

“Yes, I do.”

“Dismissed.”

**[eleven]**

The eleventh time he confesses to the world that he loves Skye, she says those words back. Well, not exactly, but Ward is still grateful.

“I don’t want you getting hurt,” he murmurs as he continues cleaning her arm wounds. “You shouldn’t have gone in there. Let alone, all by yourself.”

“I did what I had to do,” she hisses as he wipes antiseptic across the wound above her elbow. “And besides, I got out alive, didn’t I?”

“That’s not enough, Skye. I’m supposed to.. I.. I just don’t want you getting hurt. You’re the only thing I love in this world, and I don’t know what would happen if you –” He shuts up when she reaches out her hand to trace the side of his face.

“I don’t want you getting hurt, too, Grant. I don’t know what I’d do if you’re gone.”

**[twelve]**

When she does say it back, the real words, they’re undercover. (“Sir, please let me go in with Skye this time. Fitz can sit this one out.”)

“I love you,” she says and he has to remember that this is for their cover and he has to stop his heart from beating so damn fast. “I love you, too,” he replies instead as he tightens his arms around her while she looks around the dance floor for the target. She nods at him and it’s his signal that she found the guy they came for.

Everything’s a blur with a lot of shouting and a lot of firing. Everyone in the room is running and he and Skye are taking cover under the table. The table topples over when a group of people run their way and they’re exposed. He has her on her back on the floor, while he covers her body with his own. He can hear her murmuring “I love you”s to his chest as she holds on to him for dear life. He continues firing, now with a smile on his face, with one hand as he holds his body up with the other. The extraction team comes just in time because he had just spent his last ammo, and really, he doesn’t want to die just after the woman he loves told him she loves him back.

They’re both panting, and he rolls them over so she’s lying on top of him. They stay like that, oblivious to the agents gathering up the bodies in the room. He holds her close, kisses her hair and says, “I love you. You’re safe.”

**[thirteen]**

They don’t talk about what happened when they arrive on the Bus and they’re back to ignoring each other again. It’s not until one afternoon when they’re on their way to Italy that she knocks on his door. He slides it open and she’s standing there with a smile on her face and a box of  _Battleship_  in her hands. “Wanna lose?”

She leans back, tilts her head to the side, and smiles, “Say it, Ward. Come on, you’ll eventually say it. Let’s just get this over with.”

“You sunk my battleship,” he murmurs.

“I’m sorry, what?”

“You sunk my battleship,” he says again.

“For ..”

“For the third time,” he sighs and she punches the air with a silent ‘Yes! You’re a sore loser!’

He shakes his head with his lips quirked upwards and tells her, “A sore loser. I’d be offended if it was somebody else, but since I love you, I’ll let that one go.”

She falls silent after that, and when he looks up from rearranging his ships, he sees her watching him with twinkling eyes. “What?”

“Did you mean it?”

“Mean what?

“What you said..”

“About letting it go?”

“No, the uhm.. You know, the one you said  _before_  that..”

_‘Oh. That.’_ Ward sighs again and reaches for her hand across the table. “Skye, I –”

“Did you mean it?”

“Yes,” he says as he stares at their interlocked fingers. He gets silence in return, so he meets her eyes once again and he’s met with a smile and a blush. He doesn’t push her for anything, so he smiles back and when she squeezes his hand, he knows what it means.

**[fourteen]**

When he goes to her bunk the next day to say goodbye, she panics. And Skye panicking in never a good thing because you don’t want to see a woman say  _so many_  words in a minute. (‘Are they even English?’ Ward doesn’t know anymore.)

“Skye, Skye, shut up.”

“What do you mean  _shut up_? Where are you going? Why are you leaving? Is this because of what happened yesterday when you said you loved me and –”

He holds her shoulders and shakes her gently and repeats, “Skye, shut up. Let me finish.” She nods and he continues, “I’m not leaving. Well, I am, but I’ll return.”

“Then why does it look like you have your  _everything_  in your bag?” she points to the duffle bag by his feet.

“You’re my everything and you aren’t in the bag, are you?”

“Ward –”

“I know. Not the right time. I’m going back to Massachusetts later to visit my grandmother.”

“Gramzy?”

“Yeah, Gramzy. She uh- she passed away last night.”

“Oh,” she covers her mouth as concern and sadness fill her eyes. “I’m so sorry, Grant.”

“It’s okay,” he smiles at her. “It’s okay. It would’ve been for the best anyway. She was really sick and –”

He pauses when she wraps him in her arms and even if it takes him a minute to figure out what she’s doing, he wraps his arms around her, too. He hears her saying something, but it’s muffled by his chest. “What?”

She lifts her head away from his chest and reaches up so she could rest her chin on his shoulder. “Were you and Gramzy close?”

“She was the only person I’ve ever loved.”

“I’m so sorry,” she repeats again while brushing his hair with her fingers. He tightens her arms around her waist and says, “It’s okay. I found you, didn’t I?”

**[fifteen]**

He’s on leave for two weeks, and it’s far too long for Skye’s liking. So when he returns, she wastes no time in rushing up to him and jumping at him, and the next thing Ward knows, her legs are around his waist and her arms are around his neck.

“I missed you, too,” he chuckles.

“Don’t leave again,” she replies and when she realizes how stupid that sounded, she adds, “I mean,  _do_  leave if you have to go to a funeral, of course. But if not, don’t leave again. It’s really quiet here without your incessant talk about training.”

“No funerals to go anymore,” he tells her and quietly adds, “Not unless you’ll die on me.”

“I’m not going anywhere.”

“And I won’t let you.”

“Because you love me.”

“I do.”

She takes his face in her hands and decides that enough is enough. Her lips attack his and it takes him everything he’s got not to fall on his knees.

**[sixteen]**

They’re both new to this ‘relationship thingy’ (as Skye liked to call it), so when they argue (for the first time in three months), it doesn’t take a genius to realize that you should never interfere with two stubborn people shouting at each other.

“All you do is think about yourself!” she accuses him, “You never think that  _we’re here._  That  _we can_   _help_   _you_. You don’t have to do this all by yourself!”

“I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself, Skye! It was just a bullet and –”

_“Just a bullet?!”_  she shouts at him through her tears. “You could have bled to death in our own bathroom, for God’s sake!”

“But I didn’t!” (“Damn, he’s stubborn as hell,” Ward hears May across the room but he doesn’t say a word about it.)

“You don’t get it, do you?”

“Get what!”

“Ward,  _we’re here_! It’s not just about the bullet! Stop bottling up everything! That’s the reason why there’s a bullet wound on your leg!”

“It was  _my_  decision to go after my brother! I didn’t want you to get hurt because God knows what my brother will do to you once he knows that I love you!”

“I don’t give a fuck about your brother! We’re here and you don’t need to ask for help because we’re willing to give it to you!”

“I don’t need any help!  _I just need you!_ ”

All words are thrown out the window when her lips meet his and that’s a signal for the rest of the team to leave the couple.

**[seventeen]**

Two years into their relationship and Skye thinks this is the one of the most important “I love you”s she’ll ever receive. They were spending their anniversary night just by the beach where a small candlelit dinner was waiting for them. They brought the team with them, reasoning that they wouldn’t have gotten this far without them.

While the two of them ate by the shore, the rest of the team were watching (“We’re not eavesdropping, May. We’re just watching in case something bad happens.” “Whatever, Coulson.”) from the cabin. They hear Skye scream and they snap their heads to Skye and Ward’s direction, and tears of joy and proud smiles come to all their faces when they see Ward kneeling in front of Skye.

“Is that a yes?” Ward asks when Skye covers her mouth to stop her squeal. Tears form in her eyes while she nods vigorously, and as he slips the ring to her finger, the tears fall. She tackles him to the ground, and puts kisses all over his face. He chuckles and momentarily holds her face in his hands and says, “I love you.”

**[eighteen]**

When she gives birth to a baby girl (“Karolina Antonella,” they decide hours later), he’s gone away on a mission. It doesn’t help Skye that the mission is classified Level 9, or that the mission came from Agent Hand, or that the mission is with Fitz. “God, it’s like a déjà vu from three years ago.”

_“Babe, we’ll be fine,”_  Ward says through the phone, but Skye can hear shooting and if there wasn’t a baby in her stomach, she would’ve said her stomach was dropping.

“How are you even on the phone with me?!”

_“Dr. Banner told me you might be giving birth any moment now and –”_  Skye hears punching and groaning and she sighs as she waits for her husband to finish _. “– and I want to be the one who hears you scream first.”_

“You get your ass back here as soon as you can, so you can hear me scream personally!”

_“We’re in Los Angeles, but I bet you can hear her scream from New York without a phone.”_

Skye rolls her eyes, because  _not_   _again_. “Hey to you too, Leopold,” she grunts and she’s replied with more shooting from the other line. “I can’t believe you have me on speaker phone again, Grant!”

_“Do you expect me to hold my phone to my ear while –”_  And she hears screaming and shooting again, and she thinks ‘Point taken.’

“Just finish the damn mission and –”

_“One more station and we’re done,”_  Ward cuts her off.  _“I’ll see you soon. I love you.”_

“Well, tell that to that stupid army you’re fighting with and maybe they’ll let you go faster!”

_“I love my wife,”_  she hears Ward tell whoever it is he’s fighting with and she giggles when he hears a  _‘Well, that’s sweet, Romeo.’_   from the other line.

_“It worked, babe,”_  Ward whispers and Skye realizes that they’re headed to the last station if the quietness was any indication.

“See? Love can –” A contraction hits her and she screams for Jemma.

_“What’s happening?! I knew I’d be the first to hear you scream! How you doing, babe?”_

“I have to go,” Skye pants. “Be fast.”

_“I will. I love you.”_

**[nineteen]**

She’s sitting on their bed with the little pink bundle in her arms and it’s the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen.  _She’s_  the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen, and with their baby in her arms, it makes him think that he could die right here, right now. He closes the distance between the bed and the door and sits beside her.

"I love you," he says and the way she smiles at him makes him promise to whoever is up there, that he will say those three words every day if it means he can see her smile at him like that.


End file.
